She calls me, her lacecuffing the stones below the waterfall,her pearls beading the air.Her sheets are out above the field,tugging for Ireland in a westerly,

and she comes between the trees to fetch me home,her apron full of pegs,and in each handis one warm egg, laid wild.

from 'Fforest'

The King of Britain's Daughter was specially commissioned as the text of an oratorio for the 1993 Hay on Wye Festival, and is based on the story in the Mabinogion of Branwen, the daughter of Llŷr. Family legend associated the story with Fforest, the family farm, where the giant's footprint is preserved as a rock pool,and Fforest and Welsh legend have provided the inspiration for this part of the book, which also contains a variety of other vivid and memorable poems.

Gillian Clarke's poems ring with lucidity and power...her work is personal and archetypal, built out of language as concrete as it is musical.' - Times Literary Supplement Born in Cardiff, Gillian Clarke is a poet, playwright, editor, broadcaster, lecturer and translator (from Welsh). In 2008 Clarke was appointed National Poet of
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